


Happy at Home

by nothingelsematters



Series: Happy at Home [1]
Category: Bohemian Rhapsody (Movie 2018), Queen (Band)
Genre: Babies, Daddy Deaky, F/M, Fluff, Gen, Queen as Family, freddie brian and roger are so ready to be uncles, toothrotting fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-03
Updated: 2019-01-03
Packaged: 2019-10-03 12:06:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,792
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17283770
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nothingelsematters/pseuds/nothingelsematters
Summary: "You're Queen, you know. You're family."Five days before Queen depart for Ridge Farm to start making A Night At The Opera, their family gets just a little bit bigger.





	Happy at Home

**Author's Note:**

> Okay so first up I am SO SORRY to the people hanging out for the next Liar part - it is coming I promise it's just being tricky. This fic is NOT in the Liar universe.
> 
> This ficlet is also part of the reason that's late as it has been bouncing around in my head driving everything else out until it was written.
> 
> Robert's birthday and first name are factually correct. I got inventive with the rest.

The band meeting had been going for twenty minutes when Roger suddenly lifted his head out of the packing of his drum kit and asked, “Where’s John?”

Freddie and Brian emerged from their own piles of packing tape and foam and looked around, frowning. Until that moment, they hadn’t realised what the time was.

“John’s never late.”

“Do you think something happened to him? Maybe we should call his house?”

They were interrupted by the arrival of Jim, who had entered the studio with a bag slung over his shoulder, looked around, backed out again, and returned without the bag, as though he couldn’t bear to add to the mess.

“I have a message from John,” he announced, immediately capturing the attention of everyone in the room. “He won’t be joining us today, or tomorrow, or likely the next day either.”

“But we leave for Ridge Farm in five days!” Brian protested. “We need him to – oh, _wait_.”

Jim snuffed a laugh as realization dawned on the three faces in front of him.

“Yes, he called me just before to tell me to let you know that Veronica is having the baby.”

The studio was filled with a brief cacophony of noise as the three musicians expressed their excitement.

“We should go see them right away!” Freddie bounced up. “We can give them our presents!”

“We can’t go see them yet, Fred!”

“Why not, darling?”

“The baby’s probably not born yet,” Roger explained, some long-disused piece of biology textbook popping into his head. “It might not even be born til tomorrow. We can’t go up there yet.”

“Oh.” Freddie subsided back into his packing; he was in charge of the various minor instruments (like John’s triangle).

“I’m sure John will call us as soon as he has any news,” Brian said reasonably. “Meanwhile we just wait and keep pack – bloody hell, Rog, how do you get bits of drumstick _everywhere_!”

“I can’t help where they go when they break!”

Jim watched them all fondly as they subsided into bickering, as usual.

*

Some hours later, most of the rehearsal studio was packed, and the boys (and Jim) had decamped back to the apartment to begin packing the things they’d need there. Naturally, they quickly devolved from discussing how many notebooks they should take compared to musical notation books into an argument over how many pairs of shoes would exactly be required for three weeks at a farm.

“It’s all right for you, you just wear _clogs_ , but I’m telling you, five pairs of shoes is not enough!”

The shrill ring of the apartment’s telephone cut through the argument. Jim, rolling his eyes, went and answered it.

“Hello?”

“Hey, Jim.” John sounded exhausted and flat, and for a minute, Jim worried.

“Everything all right, John?”

“Jim, it’s just – it’s just…” Jim’s heart constricted for a moment, “oh Jim, he’s so _perfect_.”

“So everything’s okay?”

“Yes,” John still sounded exhausted, but now the love and pride were creeping back into his voice. “Ronnie did so _well_ , she’s sleeping now. We have a _son_. God, Jim, I’m a _dad_ …”

“What’s the name?” Jim was well aware that the other three were all hanging on his every word now.

“Robert John,” Jim could practically hear John’s smile. “He arrived about four-thirty this afternoon. Eight pounds three ounces, and perfectly healthy.”

“I’ll tell the others,” Jim said. “And John, please get some rest yourself. All the doctors and nurses are there to look after Ronnie, but don’t forget you need sleep too.”

“Yes,” John replied. “Tell them they can come up tomorrow morning.”

“Of course.”

Jim hung up the phone, and walked into the kitchen, where he retrieved the bottle of champagne he’d secretly stashed there earlier. He poured four glasses, and carried them across to the living room, where the three remaining Queen members were looking at him with as much eagerness and excitement as a child on Christmas morning.

“I’d like to propose a toast,” Jim said, handing the glasses around and holding his aloft. “To Master Robert John Deacon, born at approximately four-thirty this afternoon, weighing eight pounds and three ounces, the beloved first son of John and Veronica.”

Cheers echoed around the flat.

Freddie gulped his champagne eagerly. “Can we go up now? I want to meet him!”

“John asked me to let you all know you can visit tomorrow morning,” Jim said, knowing full well that none of the three would be happy until they’d met the baby and seen for themselves that Veronica and John were okay.

“Oh.” Freddie sat down again with a sigh.

“They probably want some alone time,” Jim explained. “Veronica will be exhausted, and to be honest, John didn’t sound much better. And they need time to bond. Don’t worry. Tomorrow morning will be here before you know it.”

*

Ten the next morning saw the three young men walking into the maternity department together, each clutching their presents and looking nervous.

“Can I help you, gentlemen?” the nurse on station asked, eyeing them suspiciously.

“Y-yes, we’re looking for Veronica Deacon?”

“And you are?”

“Her brothers-in-law,” Brian said smoothly, flashing her his most charming smile.

The nurse’s eyebrows raised as she looked at each of them, and they all knew she wasn’t fooled for a moment, but eventually she said “room twelve, down there,” and they hurried off quickly, thanking her.

Room twelve was at the end of the corridor; the charts outside the door indicated that Veronica was the only patient in there. Feeling suddenly nervous, they peeked around the door.

Veronica was apparently asleep in the bed, looking tired even with her eyes closed, her hair splayed over the pillow, but a radiant smile on her face, turned towards the window like a moth to a flame.

And sitting in a rocking chair by the window was John, the morning sun burnishing his hair to a bright copper, his face suffused with so much love and joy that it almost glowed as he sang softly down at the bundle of blankets in his arms. His voice was sweet and lovely, and even as they watched, a tiny hand emerged from the blankets to grab at the long hair falling towards it.

Freddie, Brian, and Roger held their breath, not daring to make a sound lest they disturb the tableau before them. None of them had ever seen John look like this, sound like this.

But clearly John had already developed some super dad-sense (as Brian thought of it), because he looked up, and when he saw the three of them a wide beaming grin split his face.

“Come in!”

The trio crept across the room, not wanting to disturb Veronica, and crowded over John’s shoulder.

“Isn’t he just _perfect_?” John asked proudly.

“He’s beautiful,” Brian whispered.

“He looks just like you.”

“He’s got your eyes.”

“I think he looks more like Ronnie, myself,” John chuckled. “But it’s too early to tell, and his eyes could change colour, the doctor said.”

Robert was looking at all of them curiously. The grey-green eyes and long chestnut hair above him were already, by some instinct in his heart, associated with security, safety and love. But the other eyes – the blue, the hazel, the brown – they were unfamiliar, and he watched them with as much intensity as they watched him.

John stood, carefully, not wanting to rock Robert too much. “Who wants to hold him first?”

There was a brief, but silent, tussle between Brian and Roger, won by the guitarist, who promptly sat himself in the chair; John leaned down and placed Robert in his arms, arranging Brian’s grip carefully so that he was being held correctly. Brian looked down, eyes wide.

“Hello, Robert,” he murmured. “We’ll have to find you a bass, won’t we?”

Roger was peering over his shoulder, his face showing his unabashed delight. “No, we should find him a drum kit. He’ll be perfect.”

John beamed down at both of them.

Freddie, meanwhile, had backed away from the chair as soon as John had suggested holding the baby. For the first time in a long time, he felt unsure of himself. What if the baby didn’t like him? What he accidentally hurt the baby? He wasn’t all that good with fragile things – look at the way he treated himself…

He started as he felt warm fingers close around his, and looked down to see Veronica holding his hand, her eyes open and her smile warm.

“You don’t want to hold him?”

“I’m worried I’ll break him,” Freddie admitted in a small voice.

“You won’t,” Veronica reassured him. “They’re much tougher than they look, babies.”

“I thought you were asleep,” Freddie replied, sidestepping the issue.

“I was dozing. But when John started singing – well, you know how he is, he wouldn’t do it if I was awake.”

“Congratulations.” Freddie leaned down to print a kiss on her brow.

“Are you going to hold him?” Veronica didn’t let Freddie avoid topics. That was why he loved her.

“I don’t…I don’t know…”

“I want you to, you know,” she said quietly, her face softening further as she looked up at Freddie. “He has to know he’ll be loved by his uncles. By _all_ of his uncles.”

Freddie almost melted.

“All right. In a minute. We might have to steal him away from Brian, though.”

Veronica giggled sleepily.

“I’ll have to keep an eye on you boys. I sense you four are going to spoil him rotten.”

Freddie beamed indulgently down at her. “We’re his uncles. That’s our _job_.”

Brian had finally been persuaded to let Roger have a turn, and the drummer was now staring down at the baby himself, quieter than any of them had ever seen him. The hand reached up again and grabbed at a fistful of golden hair; but Roger didn’t even flinch, just started humming happily.

John turned to Freddie, and Freddie couldn’t help it; he lurched forward and wrapped John in a hug.

“Congratulations, John.”

“Thanks,” John whispered back. “Now come on. He’s already met Uncle Bri and Uncle Rog, we have to introduce him to his Uncle Fred.”

And Freddie sat in the rocking chair and let John put his precious treasure in his arms, love welling in his heart as Robert murmured sleepily. “Hello, baby Deaky,” he whispered. “You’re Queen, you know. You’re family. We’re gonna love you so much, you’ll never have to be sad.”

Freddie looked around them. Roger was hugging John, and Brian was over at the bed talking to Ronnie.

Queen. Family. They were the one and the same. Robert would be the first of many Queen children, Freddie thought, leaning back in the chair and hugging Robert to his chest.

And their family would grow.

 

**Author's Note:**

> #whoops my cute slipped out
> 
> You can come badger me at nothingelsematterswrites.tumblr.com if you want. Badgering me for Liar parts may make them happen faster. (It also may not, but we'll see.)


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